<p>“OK, but many winners of art, drama, and dance merit awards do not major in these fields.”</p>
<p>Wait, merit awards? Let’s restrict this to the consideration of the case of Middlebury, which does not give merit awards (and actually many merit scholarships are reserved for those students who plan to pursue as a major those fields in which they demonstrate exceptional strength). Nor do arts faculty have as much a say in admission as coaches do. How many recruits does the drama department get per year? And yet one can major or minor or even just take classes in drama, but all for credit. How many philosophy recruits are there per year? What about film or other extracurriculars into which students invest just as much time as sports? But I haven’t heard of any journalism recruits or physics recruits. How is that fair?</p>
<p>“Maybe you are suggesting that we should all just use some GPA/Test score grid for admission?”</p>
<p>Maybe you are suggesting we disregard all academic information about a student entirely? When you have cutthroat competition between top tier students it is difficult to identify factors that determine who gets in and who does not. However, when you are considering the case of a top tier student against an average or even below average student who is a prominent athlete, then there is little question. </p>
<p>College decisions are arbitrary, but chances are if a less than capable student is admitted, he or she is either a) demographically interesting, b) belonging to a family likely to donate large sums to the school, or c) a recruited athlete.</p>
<p>“To assume, the student with lower grades in high school will contribute less to society after graduation is a huge leap!”</p>
<p>But to assume that the student who has demonstrated him or herself to be less capable of contribution than a top tier student has will contribute less to society is perfectly logical. Consider the average student with athletic talent enough to play varsity in college but not enough to play professionally against the elite student who is involved in cancer research. Which of those would you wager would contribute more to society? And even if the athletic recruit were to play professionally, so what? How is that contributing more to society?</p>